WHO world wide situation report finds systems to combat antibiotic resistance lacking

The WHO published April 29 2015 a world wide situation report on antibiotic resistance.

Although a quarter of countries that responded to the WHO survey have national plans to preserve antimicrobial medicines like antibiotics, there are major gaps in actions needed across all 6 WHO regions to prevent the misuse of antibiotics and reduce spread of antimicrobial resistance.

Over a 2-year period, from 2013 to 2014, WHO undertook an initial “country situation analysis” in the six WHO regions: the African Region, the Region of the Americas, the Eastern Mediterranean Region, the European Region, the South-East Asia Region and the Western Pacific Region in order to determine the extent to which effective practices and structures to address antimicrobial resistance were already in place and where gaps remained.

South-East Asia Region had the highest proportion of countries with national plans (45%) followed by the European Region with 43%.

Typically, countries cited a lack of laboratories with sufficient competent technical staff, weak infrastructure, poor data management and lack of standards as impediments to effective laboratory surveillance.

Public awareness appeared to be low in all regions.

 The full report can be downloaded HERE